Ranger's Apprentice 3 & 4 Bindup (23 page)

Deparnieux's men had been out since early that morning, sweeping scythes through the long grass that covered the field in front of Chateau Montsombre. The Gallic knight was taking no chances on the planned combat. He had seen battlehorses brought down by tangles of long grass and he wanted to make sure that the fighting ground was clear of any such danger.

Now, an hour after noon, he emerged from the sally port that he had used on the occasion of his last combat. He had no doubt that he would defeat Halt. But he also had no misconceptions about the small stranger. He had watched the constant practice sessions that Halt and Horace had been conducting and he knew the Araluan was an archer of rare skill. He had no doubt of the tactics that his opponent would be employing. The practice sessions had made them plain. Deparnieux smiled to himself. Halt's psychological tactics were interesting, he thought. The constant sight of an arrow slamming though the vision slit of a rapidly
moving helmet might well be enough to unnerve most opponents. But, while Deparnieux had little doubt about Halt's abilities, he had even less about his own. His reflexes were as sharp as a cat's and he was confident that he could deflect Halt's arrows with his shield.

The grey-haired Araluan seemed to have misjudged his opponent, he thought, and felt vaguely disappointed by the fact. He had expected so much of the stranger. Now, it seemed, those early impressions had come to very little. Halt was an expert bowman, that was all. He had no supernatural powers or arcane skills. In fact, thought the warlord, he was a rather limited, rather boring man with a high opinion of himself. He doubted the archer's claim to royal lineage but that no longer mattered to him. The man deserved to die, and Deparnieux would be happy to oblige him.

There were none of the usual flourishes of trumpets or ruffles of side drums as Deparnieux cantered his black charger slowly onto the combat field. This was not a day for ceremony. This was a simple working day for the black knight. An interloper had challenged his authority and his pre-eminence in the area. It was necessary to dispatch such people with maximum efficiency.

For all that, virtually every member of the staff of Chateau Montsombre, and a good many of Deparnieux's fighting men, were present to witness the combat. He smiled wolfishly as he wondered how many of them were watching in the hope that they would see him defeated. More than a few, he thought. But they were doomed to disappointment. In fact, the despatch of the archer would serve a useful purpose for him. Nothing would serve
discipline so well as the sight of the chateau's lord and master dealing a quick death to an upstart interloper.

Speak of the devil, there he was now. The archer was cantering onto the far end of the field now, on his absurd little barrel of a horse. He wore no armour, only a studded leather vest that would give him no protection at all against Deparnieux's lance and sword. And, of course, his ever-present grey and green dappled cloak.

His young companion rode a few paces behind him. He was fitted out in chain mail and had his helmet slung at the saddle bow of his battlehorse. He wore his sword and carried the round buckler emblazoned with the oakleaf symbol.

Interesting, thought Deparnieux. Obviously, in the event of Halt's inevitable defeat, his young fellow traveller would attempt to avenge his friend. All the better, thought the black knight. If one death would serve as a salutary lesson to his more unruly retainers, two would be doubly effective. After all, that was how this entire disappointing business had started in the first place.

He brought his horse to a stop now, testing his grip on the lance in his right hand, ensuring that he had it at just the right point of balance. At the far end of the field, his opponent continued to ride forward, slowly and steadily. He seemed ridiculously small, dwarfed by the muscular youth and the huge battlehorse that paced beside him.

‘I hope you know what you're doing,' Horace said, trying to speak without moving his lips, in case Deparnieux was watching – which he undoubtedly was. Halt turned in the saddle and almost smiled at him.

‘So do I,' he said quietly. He noticed that Horace's right hand was easing his sword in its scabbard once more. He had done that same thing at least half a dozen times as they rode forward. ‘Relax,' he added calmly. Horace glanced at him openly now, no longer caring if Deparnieux saw him or not.

‘Relax?' he repeated incredulously. ‘You're going to fight an armoured knight with nothing more than a bow and you tell me to relax?'

‘I'll have one or two arrows as well, you know,' Halt told him mildly and Horace shook his head in disbelief.

‘Well … I just hope you know what you're doing,' he said again. Halt smiled at him now. Just the briefest flash of a smile.

‘So you keep saying,' he replied. Then he nudged Abelard with his knee and the little horse came to a stop, ears pricked and ready for more signals. Halt's eyes locked on the distant figure in the black armour and he raised his right leg over the saddle bow and slid off the horse.

‘Take him out of harm's way,' he told the apprentice, and Horace leant down and took the Ranger horse's rein. Abelard twitched his ears and looked inquisitively at his master.

‘Go along,' Halt told him quietly and the horse allowed himself to be led away. Halt glanced once at the youth sitting astride the battlehorse. He could see the worry in every line of the boy's body.

‘Horace?' he called and the apprentice warrior stopped and looked back at him.

‘I do know what I'm doing, you know.'

Horace managed a wan smile at that.

‘If you say so, Halt,' he said.

As they were talking, Halt carefully selected three arrows from the two dozen in his quiver and slid them, point down, into the top of his right boot. Horace saw the movement and wondered at it. There was no need for Halt to place his arrows ready to hand in that way. He could draw and fire from the quiver on his back in a fraction of a second.

He didn't have time to wonder about it any further. Deparnieux was calling from the far end of the field.

‘My lord Halt,' his accented voice came to Horace clearly as he reined in, off to one side. ‘Are you ready?'

Not bothering to speak, Halt raised a hand in reply. He looked so small and vulnerable, Horace thought, standing all alone in the centre of the mown field, waiting for the black-clad knight on his massive battlehorse to bear down on him.

‘Then may the best man win!' shouted Deparnieux mockingly, and this time Halt did reply.

‘I plan to,' he called back, as Deparnieux clapped his spurs to the horse and it began to lumber forward, building up to a full gallop as it came.

It struck Horace then that Halt had not said anything to him about what he should do if Deparnieux were victorious. He had half expected the Ranger to instruct him to try to escape. He certainly expected that Halt would forbid him to challenge Deparnieux immediately after the combat – which was precisely what Horace planned to do if Halt lost. He wondered now if the Ranger hadn't said anything because he knew that Horace would ignore any such instruction, or if it were
simply because he was totally confident of emerging as the victor.

Not that there seemed any way that he could. The earth shook under the hooves of the black battlehorse and Horace's expert eye could see that the Gallic warlord was a warrior of enormous experience and natural ability. Perfectly balanced in his seat on the horse, he handled the long, heavy lance as if it were a lightweight staff, leaning forward and rising slightly in his stirrups as the point of his lance drew ever closer to the small figure in the grey-green cloak.

It was the cloak that first sent a slight feeling of misgiving through Deparnieux's mind. Halt was swaying slightly as he stood his ground, and the uneven patterns on the cloak, set against the grey-green of the mown winter grass, seemed to send his figure in and out of focus. The effect was almost mesmerising. Angrily, Deparnieux thrust the distracting thought aside and tried to centre his attention on the archer. He was close now, barely thirty metres away, and still the archer hadn't …

He saw it coming. A blur of movement as the bow came up and the first arrow spat towards him at incredible speed, coming straight towards the vision slits in his helmet and bringing instant oblivion with it.

Yet, fast as the arrow was travelling, Deparnieux was even faster, raising the shield in a slant to deflect the arrow. He felt it slam against the shield, steel screeching on steel as it gouged a long furrow in the gleaming black enamel then went hissing off as the shield deflected it.

But the shield was now blocking his sight of the little man and he lowered it quickly.

All the devils in hell take him! It was what Halt had planned on, firing a second arrow even as the shield was still up! Deparnieux's incredible reflexes saved him again, bringing the shield back up to deflect the treacherous second shot. How could anyone manage to fire so quickly, he thought, then cursed as he realised that, unsighted as he was, he had already been carried past the spot where the archer stood, calmly stepping out of the line of the lance point.

Deparnieux let the battlehorse slow to a canter, wheeling him in a wide arc. It wouldn't do to risk injury to the horse by trying to wheel it too quickly. He'd take his time and …

At that moment there was a bright flash of pain in his left shoulder. Twisting awkwardly, his vision constricted by the helmet, he realised that, as he had galloped past, Halt had sent another arrow spitting at him, this time aiming for the gap in his armour at the shoulder.

The chain mail that filled the gap had taken most of the force of the arrow, but the razor-sharp broadhead had still managed to shear through a little way and penetrate the flesh. It was painful, but only minor, he realised, moving the arm quickly to ensure that no major muscles or tendons had been damaged. If the fight were to be a prolonged one, it could stiffen and affect his shield defence.

As it was, the wound was a nuisance. A painful nuisance, he amended, as he felt the hot blood trickling down his armpit. Halt would pay for that, he promised himself. And he would pay dearly.

Because now, Deparnieux believed he understood Halt's plan. He would continue to blind him as he came
charging in, forcing him to raise the shield to protect his eyes at the last minute, then sidestepping as Deparnieux went charging past.

Except the knight had no intention of playing Halt's game. He would abandon the wild high-speed charge with a lance for a slow, deliberate approach. After all, he didn't need the force and momentum of a charge. He wasn't facing another armoured knight, trying to knock him from the saddle. He was facing a man standing alone in the middle of the field.

As the plan came to him, he tossed the long, unwieldy lance to the ground, reached round and broke the arrow shaft off close to his shoulder, and tossed it after the lance.

Then, drawing his broadsword, he began to trot slowly to where Halt stood, waiting for him.

He kept Halt to his left, so that the shield would be in position to deflect his arrows. The long sword in his right hand swung easily in circles as he felt its familiar weight and perfect balance.

Watching, Horace felt his heart thud faster in his chest. There could only be one end to the contest now. Once Deparnieux had abandoned the headlong charge for a more deliberate approach, Halt was in serious trouble. Horace knew that nine out of ten knights would have continued to charge, outraged by Halt's tactics and determined to crush him with their superior force. Deparnieux, he could see now, was the one in ten who would quickly see the folly in that course, and find a tactic to nullify Halt's biggest advantage.

The mounted knight was only forty metres away from the small figure now, moving slowly towards him. As
before, the bow came up and the arrow was on its way. Deftly, almost contemptuously, Deparnieux flicked his shield up to deflect the arrow. This time, he heard the ringing screech of its impact and lowered the shield again. He could see the next arrow, already aimed at his head. He saw the archer's hand begin the release and again brought the shield up as the arrow leapt towards him.

But there was one important item he didn't see.

This arrow was one of the three that Halt had placed in the cuff of his boot. And this arrow was different, with a much heavier head, made from heat-hardened steel. Unlike the normal war arrows in Halt's quiver, it was not a leaf-shaped broadhead. Rather, it was shaped like the point of a cold chisel, surrounded by four small spurs that would stop it deflecting from Deparnieux's plate armour and allow it to punch through into the flesh behind.

It was an arrowhead designed to pierce armour and Halt had learnt its secrets years before, from the fierce mounted archers of the eastern steppes.

The arrow flew from the bow. As Deparnieux raised his shield, he never saw the extra weight of the head already causing it to drop below its point of aim. The arrow arced in underneath the slanted shield and punched into the breastplate exposed there, with barely a check to its speed and force.